Marketplace (38 page)

That’s my man, she thought,
arching up away from him and then settling back down. Oh, yes,
that’s it. Nice and open, nice and wet, nice and easy. Oh, you know
the secret here, big guy, just stick with what works and do it over
and over again, until... ah, yes, that’s it! And that’s enough of
that for now. Nearing her own pleasure, she denied it to him and
pulled away. There was something else she had her eye on, and now
was the time to get it.

Robert gulped air, and
moaned. But he didn’t know if he was moaning because of the sudden
deprivation, or because of deep, sincere gratitude. He managed to
gasp out, “Thank you, ma’am! Thank you so much!”

“Oh, but it’s not over
yet,” Alex assured him. He felt her touch the head of his cock and
put something on it. Was it another torture device? He felt her
fingers along the sides, rubbing him, no, pushing something
down...

She was covering his cock
with a rubber. He began to shake, and she squeezed his erection in
her hands as she unrolled the condom all the way to the base of his
cock.

“You’re going to keep it up
until I get mine,” she said, maintaining her soft voice. “No
protests, no failures.”

And with that, she turned
around, made herself comfortable again, and guided herself onto
him. As she predicted when she first saw it, his big handsome cock
filled her nicely, and sinking onto it made her feel like she was
sitting on a fat, warm pole. She shifted for comfort and rose to
accommodate more of him.

Robert felt as though he
could die, right now, of pleasure. It had been ages since his cock
was in a woman like this, and he had almost forgotten what that
felt like. The images and sensations that barreled into each other
in his brain were of hot honey and velvet walls, smooth creams and
warm towels. He shuddered and lifted his hips to meet her, and she
rode him easily, shifting to give herself more pleasure and a
better position to ride in.

Before long, he was giving
out little cries as she rose and fell, and those cries gave way to
harsh gasps of breath when she rocked back and forth. Alexandra
stroked herself, very turned on by the body and the thick cock of
the man beneath her, and sighed as her body settled into a rhythm
that would take her over the top.

“That’s it,” she murmured,
thrusting her hips forward, “that’s it, such a good boy, keep it
nice and hard, nice and fat, while I ride...”

“Yes, ma’am,” he wrenched
out, pulling against all his bonds now. “Oh, yes ma’am! Use me,
ma’am!”

Alex took one deep, rasping
breath and then began to come. It started out feeling mild, the way
it usually did, but she rode it until her hips thrust back into and
onto him, and her entire body shook with the need for that final
pleasure. Her breaths came in gasps, shaking her body from head to
toe, as the quake of sensation erupted between her legs. She rode
him as the steady contractions subsided a little, and noticed that
he was still hard!

He had not come.

“Good boy,” she breathed
softly, stroking his chest. Carefully, she rose off of him, hissing
a little when he slid out of her, and then she got down from the
table. As she stretched and looked at him, she saw that his teeth
were still clenched tightly shut, probably his mechanism to keep
from coming. Good boy, she thought. Very good.

She hit the cuffs one after
the other, releasing them. “When you’ve put the cuffs away and
cleaned this place up a little, come to my room. If I’m already
asleep, you’ll find your place at the foot of my bed.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he whispered
finally, not even knowing if she was still in the room. “Thank you,
ma’am.”

Chapter
Eighteen

Days passed, merging with
each other. And Sharon and Brian became obsessed with Grendel‘s
refusal to either use them sexually or even call them to serve him
in the evening. Claudia and Robert tried to downplay their
increased activities with Alexandra, so that they wouldn’t cause
undue stress for their companions, but their repeated absences from
the dorm made that impossible.

It was even worse when
Alexandra told both of her slave trainees that she expected to loan
them to Grendel for some training of a different sort. They both
kept that nugget of information to themselves.

Brian recovered from his
days as a pet and threw himself wholeheartedly into being a really
good slave. He finished his tasks quickly and ran to Claudia for
instructions for the next one. He kept his body scrupulously clean,
and began to practice certain bows, genuflections, and postures
when he was in the bathroom, so he could execute them in the
best-looking way. When he was with Jack, he concentrated on giving
nothing but world-class blowjobs, and eagerly assumed whatever
strange position Jack dreamt up for him. One day, after a
particularly long session involving spurs and a rubber bit, Jack
laconically admitted that “You an’ th’ model are about neck ’n’
neck at th’ line for ’oo gives the best nut bathin’, but you’re a
sweet one t’fuck, m’boy!”

Claudia admitted that she
really had no complaints about his performance and Chris could find
nothing glaringly disappointing. He never had another “accident.”
When they took away his cage and belt, he thought, “Now, maybe
now!” But still, nothing happened.

One late night, he got up
out of bed to use the bathroom, padding down the hall in the dim
light cast by various hallway fixtures. When he heard something
clinking in the direction of the main hallway, he froze. At first,
he thought he was hearing things. Who the hell would be walking
around at some ungodly hour in this house? The owners were both
early risers, and Chris, well, that guy just never
slept...

At that thought, Brian
turned and went the other way down the hall, toward the big
staircase and the main hall. He slipped down the stairs, toward the
sound, and stopped cold when he almost ran into it. Or him. Because
it was indeed Chris. A Chris he could never have
imagined.

The stocky majordomo was
decked out in what the boys called “full leathers.” His regular
work boots had been replaced with gleaming black engineer boots,
one with a simple silver chain around the left ankle. Leather jeans
rode on the boots, ending right above the ankle. Under that
motorcycle jacket Brian remembered from Chris’s office, the man was
wearing a crisp black shirt, crossed by a Sam Browne belt. Tight at
his throat was a narrow black tie. Jammed on top of his short,
thick hair was a black officer’s cap, the brim gleaming.

Brian’s mouth went dry just
before Chris caught him by the throat and pushed him violently
against the wall.

“Why the fuck are you out
of bed?” he demanded, his voice very low. “What the hell are you
doing down here?”

“Please!” Brian choked. He
clutched at the hands holding him.

“Tell me!” Chris demanded,
loosening his grip slightly.

“I heard... I heard you
from upstairs,” Brian said, after a cough. “I was going to the
bathroom... I thought it might be... I thought I should
invest...”

“Who did you think it might
be?” Chris pushed. “A burglar?”

“No!” Brian shook his head.
“I thought it might be you.”

Chris let him go. “Idiot,”
he spat. “Well, it’s me. Now go back to bed.”

“But... wait...” Brian
reached out and touched Chris’s jacket lightly. “Please...it’s been
so long. Please, let me, just let me look...”

Chris shook his head. “Why
don’t you understand?” he asked, taking his cap off. He ran his
fingers through his matted hair. “This isn’t real, Brian. This is
just costumes. You’re lusting for something that doesn’t
exist.”

“But you wear it. You live
it!” Brian insisted. “This is you!”

“No, Brian. This isn’t me,
it’s just a skin I wear. I live this!” The majordomo reached out
and thumped the banister of the staircase. “And I live this!” He
stamped one boot against the floor. “This house, and its owners,
are my life.

“I do this, when I go
hunting.” He spread his hands, showing off the outfit.

“Hunting for what?” Brian
asked, knowing the answer.

“For little lost boys like
you, who don’t know enough to be in their own beds in the middle of
the night.” Chris tucked his cap under one arm in a gesture Brian
had seen thousands of times. “Go back to sleep.”

“Please,” Brian begged.
“Please tell me one thing.”

“What, Brian, what? I don’t
have all night!”

“Grendel, not using me...
does it have something to do with the way I... with how I messed up
that first day? Does anyone else know? Do you hate me? Do you know
how sorry I am?” His words came out in a rush, questions he never
could have asked in front of the others, perhaps one of the reasons
he had never really remembered to share his gossip with
them.

Chris sighed. “That’s not
my business,” he said gently. “Yes, some people know, but not most.
I’m not sensitive about it. No, I don’t hate you. I have never
asked for an apology because Mr. Elliot didn’t seem to think that
one was necessary, and I am generally guided by him in these
things. But if it will make you sleep easier, I accept your
apology. Now get back to bed before I beat you the hell up those
stairs.” And with that, he gave one good swat at Brian and sent him
up the stairs and back toward the bathroom.

In the morning, the whole
episode almost seemed like a dream.

* * * *

“Tonight, you go to
Grendel,” Alexandra told Claudia when she arrived. “You might as
well go now; he’s waiting. And don’t disappoint me,
girl.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Claudia
automatically responded. And then she walked around the inner
balcony to the other wing and came to a stop in front of Grendel’s
door, and found herself inside before she even realized that she
had gone. There was a dreadful, heavy feeling in the pit of her
stomach. The time had come.

I must be brave, she
thought, pouring his coffee and delivering it to him while he
soaked in his jacuzzi. She placed the cup and saucer down gingerly
on the little carved wooden stool next to his head rest, and
retreated to the spot he told her to kneel in, across the room,
where he could see her fully. By the time she got there and settled
down, he had opened his eyes and was sitting up a little more to
get to the drink.

“So,” Grendel said, after
drinking for a while. “Alex thinks you’re coming along very well.
What do you think?”

“I hope I’m doing well
enough to make my Mistress consider taking me back, sir,” she
replied honestly. “I’m doing my best.”

“Well, complaints about you
have been very scant,” he admitted. “You’ve even improved
dramatically in your organizational skills.”

“Thank you,
sir.”

He nodded. “Of course,
there is the little matter of what you’re so terrified about
tonight.”

She blushed suddenly and
ducked her head. “Was it that obvious, sir?”

“It was obvious to Alex
when she first casually mentioned that she might like to loan you
to me. It’s obvious in the way you talk to me, and it’s also
obvious in the way you’ve approached certain facts of life around
here. So why don’t we cut to the chase, and you tell me exactly
what you think the problem is.”

Claudia shifted nervously
and lowered her eyes again. Grendel’s voice was so nice and
friendly right now, surely he’d understand! But how could she
explain that she... that she...

“I’m a virgin,” she blurted
out.

“Yes, I know,” Grendel
nodded and finished his coffee.

“What?” Claudia’s head
bounced back up, and she looked into Grendel’s amused eyes. “But...
but how...?”

“I’ll explain. But first,
fetch me a towel, and then get my robe, please.” She rushed to do
as he said, and he continued to speak while she attended to
him.

“It was really simple. Alex
was the one who put it all together. One, you as much told us so in
your personal bio, when you mentioned that you broke up with your
first boyfriend when he became insistent over the issue of sex, and
then you never mentioned a sexual experience with a man or
dildo-wielding dyke lover.” He ticked off one finger. “Two,
Madeleine suspected something of the sort.” He held up the second
finger. “And three, Alex thought that you felt resistant on a
number of occasions when she wanted to get more than slightly
penetrative with you. Now each of these alone would not have been
enough. But all three, plus your thinly disguised fear of being
sexually used by men, did indicate a certain something that needed
resolution.”

She bowed her head again.
“I’m sorry, sir.”

“Nothing to be sorry
about,” he said lightly. “It’s a common condition, we all have it
at one time or another. Of course, you should have realized that
this was something that should have been brought to someone’s
attention. You should have told Madeleine, and you should have told
us. There are some people who actually think that your state of
being sexually aware and functional while still being ‘intact’ is
of special value. Personally, I think the whole concept of valuing
something everyone is born with but only half the population can
evidence is barbaric.”